Elora Wilde's Arc

Chapter 2 of 9

Rowan led her north through the pines, moving fast along a deer trail he knew by feel. Elora kept close behind him with her bow strung and her gloves pulled tight against the cold. The fox was safe on her counter. Six men were not far ahead. She had spent two years believing quiet work would be enough, and tonight she meant to prove herself wrong. At a bend in the trail his hand brushed hers. Sparks jumped up his arm, white and sudden, climbing to his shoulder before they faded. Rowan stopped. He turned to look at her. Elora's face showed nothing. She glanced past him at the trees and waved him forward. Her leather gloves had swallowed the touch. She had felt only pressure, and then nothing. He opened his mouth to speak. He closed it. He knew what the sparks meant. He had heard the old stories from his mother. But there was no time, and he did not have the words yet, so he swallowed them and walked on. They smelled the camp before they saw it. Woodsmoke, boiled meat, wet canvas. Rowan crouched behind a fallen log and pointed. Through the brush Elora counted four tents pitched around a low fire, a stew pot hanging from a tripod, log seats scarred by boot heels. A man stood watch at the near edge with a hatchet in his belt. Behind him she could see coils of fresh wire stacked on a crate, ready to be run through the woods before dawn. Elora drew an arrow and set it to the string. She lifted the runed bow and sighted on the guard's thigh. She did not want to kill him. She wanted him limping home and telling the others what waited in these trees. Her breath slowed. Her fingers tightened on the string. Then something landed on the arrow shaft, light as ash. A butterfly. Its wings glowed purple and pale blue in the dark, brighter than the fire behind it. It folded and opened its wings once, slow, and stayed. She could not loose the arrow without breaking it. She held the draw. Rowan went still beside her. The butterfly turned its head toward her, and the small movement felt like being spoken to. She eased the string down and lowered the bow. The guard yawned and turned back to the fire, unaware. Elora lifted her hand and the butterfly stepped onto her glove, weightless. She did not understand yet what it wanted. She understood that she had come here to put an arrow in a man, and something older than her plan had said no. She looked at Rowan. "We go back," she whispered. "Tonight I follow this." He nodded once. They slipped away from the camp with the wire still stacked and the snares still waiting, and the butterfly held its place on her hand.